It’s no secret that Bandai Namco is hosting a Closed Network Testing of FromSoftware’s latest game, Elden Ring. This is due to take place between the 12th - 15th of November for players who have signed up and are hopefully selected. There will be no narrative spoilers to this preview, but more so just thoughts… and just to be clear, you have NO idea how difficult it was not being able to post up or take photos of what I was playing, seeing and experiencing.

Now that we have that all out of the way, what was provided would seem to be a slightly easier run at the game, than, somewhat making you feel a little over-powered, at least that’s what it felt like to me. However, I wasn’t sure if this is due to being used to the Souls mechanics and being a bit more of an experienced player, or if they did actually make it easier to let the beta testers traverse the lands, and yes, there still isn’t the option to change the game’s difficulty. However, the thought occurred to me that FromSoftware could possibly have made Elden Ring easier to capture a wider audience and have more players. We all know how challenging FromSoftware games are. I hope they keep it the same difficulty as all other souls games as the supposed challenging fights in the demo was actually easy. I can honestly say I breezed through the Wyvern (dragon) that we see in the recent trailer… the caravan of people carting through the lands were disappointingly too easy as well. So, fingers crossed the full release ramps up the difficulty.

In terms of gameplay, FromSoftware really combined the Dark Souls franchise with what they’ve learnt from Sekiro, in fact sneaking feels very similar to their previous release and though the jump mechanic is definitely one that’s welcomed in this game, it feels a little odd to the point where it feels like your character is floating at some points. It’s definitely not a showstopper but feels a little strange when you feel as though you shouldn't be able to jump onto some surfaces but end up gliding upwards a rock a little, as an early build though, that might be something that changes prior to the full release.

Something that is different is that Elden Ring lets players use 2 Estus flasks… one to regenerate your HP, and the other for magic. This should let players focus on whether your build will lean more as a magic user, or one that’s geared towards a melee attack, as you’re able to distribute how many times you’re able to use them. So, for magic users, you might want to top up more uses for your FP flask (Flask of Cerulean Tears) from the HP flask (Flask of Crimson Tears), enabling you to replenish your magic more. What will be interesting, is to see what type of builds that people will take with this, what a pure magic user would be like. Quite similarly to Demon’s Souls, the magic user did feel a little overpowered in this build, however, as enemies scale in difficulty as you progress, I’d be genuinely curious to know if the magic abilities would still feel as powerful if.

Speaking of Magic, when I tested the Blood Wolf class, I noted my weapons may have some magic abilities attached to them. In the demo, there seemed to be a lighting type magic/attack, with more being unlocked as I progressed. In my experience, this showed as a slight lightning damage with every attack, with an additional option to summon a quick lightning blast from the sky, as though you were Thor. I’m really curious to know what other abilities will be available, and if these are able to be modified along the way. I was able to move that lightening ability from the sword that the game provided, to my good ‘ol trusty Longsword. In addition to weapon modification is weapon creation, which let me create basic items like arrows, to more dangerous items like fire pots, but it isn’t just weapons, I was also able to make up good to heal my horse. This addition was something that didn’t seem all that surprising as the devs have emphasised it by letting players kill and ‘farm’ items from the wild animals roaming the lands.

Players should really stop reading this and just wait to be able to explore the world George RR Martin and Miyazaki-san has created… which feels huge! Sure, there are a lot of people who complain about the visuals and graphics… stating how dated it may look etc.. but as far as I was concerned, looking at the landscape was amazing… the design… detail… graphics... just everything about the world they created looked gorgeous. Mind you, the area of the map we were given was supposedly the northern map, and within it, there was a fog wall that kept us contained within the area. To add, being able to jump up (and down) on ledges and platforms makes it feel like an open world, rather than the stock standard linear game style of the Dark Souls series. I’m definitely looking forward exploring the other areas across this world. Especially at the fact that they’ve taken the time to implement details such as surrounding architecture and ruins that can fall apart during battles.

One thing that I still haven’t worked out is at what height, or what triggers the fall damage (on both riding on steed and not). From a massive height, it is obvious that you’ll die, but some cliff edges will let you only take a small amount of damage, while others at no damage all the way to sudden death. Speaking of being able to ride your steed, it does make the lands easier to travel through… but one concern to me is the using the steed to attack and confront enemies, which made my battle with the dragon, and so on.

Something that I have a little concern with is the overall difficulty of the build, it just feels a little too easy, this could be either FromSoftware trying to get a wider reach to audience and fans by reducing the difficulty, which all their predecessors are notoriously known for, which normally turns the generic gamers away; or they purposely made it a little easier for this demo. This has the upside of welcoming more players in, which lets these beta testers go through a wider variety of gameplay opposed to being stuck in a small area or a boss in the limited time they have to trial it, I am hoping though that the full game is harder or allows for some form of difficulty adjustment. Elden Ring really feels like Dark Souls 4 to me… and yes, there’s high familiarity in terms of the visual styling, aesthetics, animations and more which will leave Souls fans extremely happy.

All I can say is, Dark Souls fans will be extremely happy to finally be able to play and explore this game, but as this is just a single slice from what is most assuredly going to be a much larger game, who knows how it will evolve. What I can say is for those players who traditionally stay away from Souls games, once this is out, please do give it a real shot, as I was one of those players who initially, didn’t understand the gameplay loop of the Souls genre. My first Souls-like game was Bloodborne, which I gave it a very low score and review without understanding it… which took a few years to really sink in and playing Sekiro, to actually understand and enjoy the Souls-like series. Elden Ring already feels like a big improvement as FromSoftware have come a long way since then and have refined their genre a whole lot more. I’m absolutely cannot wait to play the full release, exploring the lands as a tarnished, seeing what weapon combinations I can come up with and more. As long as the game is harder, for my preference, Elden Ring could be the best title from the developers, who seem to truly grasp the genre that they created and when the masters are at work, the results are seemingly going to be excellent.

Elden Ring is coming to Xbox Series X, PlayStation 5, PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4, with the release date set for February 25th, 2022.